Mainstream neocons seem to say the Arab countries started the war and Israel heroically fought them off.
I read Rothbard’s article "War Guilt in the Middle East"
but he just says “Israel launched the war”…he doesn’t go into ANY detail as to who started the war beyond that. He does say that Israel claims they were defending themselves.
So, who started the war of 1967? And is there alot of proof?
Rothbard is infallable, but so is Dr. Paul and they said the opposite thing. Dr. Paul faults the Arabs in the Zionist chapter of Liberty Defined IIRC.
Perhaps we’ll never know?
If you’re asking who fired the first bullet, then every informed Israeli will tell you that they did. So there is no debate over this issue. In fact, there is great israeli national pride in how the Israeli Air Force caught all 3 Arab States basically with their pants down. Of course they will also argue that it was a preemptive strike out of purely defensive considerations.
All the Arab countries were preparing to go to war with Israel. Rather than let the Arabs strike first Israel attacked, and took out all three countries air forces while they were still on the ground. Then they invaded.
“All the Arab countries were preparing to go to war with Israel.”
Can you be more specific? Were they starting acts of war?
They were building up their armies talking rhetoric. I’m sorry I can’t be more specific because wiki is closed and I can’t remember all the facts, but they were definitely preparing for war. Its probably worth mentioning that I am not a zionist. Although Israel was not justified in taking all the land they did, I think that the initial aggression was justified, so long as you believe they had a right to land they were already occupying.
If the Arab countries were indeed preparing to invade Israel - and the evidence appears to be in favor of this - then they were the aggressors and Israel was defending itself by taking preemptive action against a clear and present threat.
The above is all said in the context of statism, of course.
Egypt wanted the Sinai, Jordan wanted the West Bank, and Syria wanted the Golan Heights… All of which had been taken from them by Israel in previous wars. If we allow for the fiction of any state legitimately claiming anything, any war they were planning prior to the Israeli “pre-emptive strike” in '67 would have been intended to take back stolen property by force, which libertarians tend to accept as a legitimate reciprocation of force already initiated…
The establishment of Israel was the initiation of force, imo, to which the appropriate reciprocation will always be the disestablishment thereof.
I stand corrected. Thanks for reminding me of that, James.
Just to add… I have no idea when it happened, due to Wikipedia being down (I’ve been SOPA-roled so many times today it isn’t funny anymore), but I’m fairly sure none of those three Arab states had recognised Israel’s legitimacy at that point in time. They had ceasefire/armistice arrangements - not a peace treaty recognising Israeli legitimacy over any territory, leave alone that which had been taken from them specifically.
I think they’ve all recognised Israel since then. Not 100% sure about Syria… I know they want the Golan Heights back.
West Bank and Golan Heights were lost to Israel in the 1967 6 day war! What do you think they mean when they demand Israel returns to its 67 borders.
As for Sinai, it’s true, however, this only takes you back to the debate over the causes of the previous war a decade earlier with Egypt.
That’s how all States come to be.
Ok, I stand corrected, just the Sinai…
This is a sad situation, you Americans need to get your shit together about this SOPA thing.
Yes, which is why I added that bit about peace treaties and recognition of legitimacy.
Yep, DD5 is right. I stand corrected again. 
Yes, DD5 is right.
You are conflating the Yom Kippur and the Six Day War. The 1973 Yom Kippur War was launched by Egypt and Syria (Jordan stayed out) to try to recapture the areas lost in the 1967 Six Day War (actually Sadat launched it to satisfy the outraged pro-war constituency and to regain some of the lost prestige).
Creveld, a known Israeli military historian, defends the Six Days War in light of the fact that the word of the imminence of an Israeli nuclear device had forced its Arab neighbors to scramble a massive army because is they couldn’t bring down Israel in ’67 they would never have been able to.
If this is true, and in view of the less than stellar performance of the IDF (at least in the Golan) in ’73 when it was the Israel’s turn to get caught with its pants down, the ’67 preemptive strike meant the difference between Israel existing today or not.
Yeah, you’re right, I was conflating the two.
But of course Sinai had been taken before the 1967 war, and was returned (I believe) in accordance with the eventual peace treaty with Egypt.
According to Michael Brecher (Decision in Crisis: Israel in 1967 and 1973 and , yes, I know it’s the most generic title possible) there were three “tripwires” that drove Israel to war.
The first was the withdrawal of UN peacekeepers (UN Emergency Force I) from the borders between Egypt and Israel. This was carried out to comply with a request from the United Arab Republic, backed by the Soviet Union. UN General Secretary U Thant complied despite protests from France and the United Kingdom.
The second were “suspect” troop movements near the Sinai which, to be honest, were the result of either a colossal mistake or downright deception on part of the Soviet Union. Anwat Sadat had been briefed by the KGB in Moscow about Israel deploying ten to twelve brigade in preparation for an attack on Syria and hence Nasser ordered the Egyptian army to be deployed near the Suez Channel. Israeli intelligence became aware of this briefing while Sadat was still in Moscow, indicating they had infiltrated either the Soviet intelligence or the highest ranks of the Egyptian military.
The third were the frequent overflies by Egyptian or Soviet aircraft of the area near the nuclear research facilities at Dimona. Overflies intesified around May 1967, leading the Israeli leadership to believe (correctly as it turned out) Nasser wanted to strike the first blow, obtaining and consolidating territoral gains before Israel had a nuclear deterrent. Nasser believed Israel would not have nuclear weapons before 1968 and planned accordingly. According to LTC Warren Farr (The Third Temple’s Holy of Holies: Israel’s Nuclear Weapons, published by the USAF Counterproliferation Center) Israel assembled its first two nuclear weapons and went to war ten days later.
Also Israel’s legendary intelligence service had made a big mistake of its own: they believed (wrongly as it turned out) the Soviet Union had supplied Egypt with advanced nerve gas. Egypt had various chemical agents but nothing as advanced as the Israeli believed. Also their meager stocks had recently been depleted in Yemen and Moscow still wasn’t willing to supply her Arab allies with advanced weaponry.
What finally sent Israel over the edge was the closure of Straits of Tiran in May 1967. Israel’s Prime Minister, Levi Eshkol, had made clear to both Johnson and De gaulle Israel would not attack the UAR unless the Straits of Tiran were closed off. This was Israel’s main gateway to Asia and her main crude supplier, Iran (ironic, isn’t it?). According to international law this was an act of war.
Nasser had swallowed the Soviet bait, and took in hook, line and sinker when he went on one of his famous speeches proclaiming in front of hundreds of foreing reporters “We will not accept any coexistence with Israel”.
This phrase, together with the aforementioned closure of the Straits of Tiran had put Israel in a very favorable light with the West: the defiant little State surrounded by hordes of barbarians armed to the teeth by the Soviets. International law was on Israel’s side too, as an ultimatum had been formally issued before the first shots were fired.
It must also be said the occupation of the Jordanian West Banks was not premeditated. In fact Israel negotiated with King Husain to the last minute to keep Jordan out of the war and Moshe Dayan instructed the IDF not to fight the Jordanians. This changed when the Arab monarch (probably trying to prove to the Egyptian revolutionaries and their Soviet allies his support for the Arab cause) ordered his artillery to shell civilian targets in both West Jerusalem and Tel Aviv. In two days Jerusalem was completely conquered by the Israeli and the Jordanian military humiliated.
Hell, if the authors of Foxbats over Dimona have got even a kernel of truth in that book, Israel appears to be both the luckiest and the most badass country ever for launching the ’67 preemptive strike.
The first MIG25R prototype flew in 1969. Four preproduction machines went to Egypt in 1971 under the designation X-500 and perfomed 20 overflights of Israel. Ironically enough the Israeli were well informed of the reconnaisance schedule by their operatives in both the Soviet Union and Egypt so they pretty much showed only what they want to show (an old trick also used by the Soviets to appear much more formidable than they really were when the first Keyhole satellites went in space: that’s why the Habu remained in service so long).
The Soviets had built a specialized aircraft for these overflight, the MIG21RF, which was a variation of the standard MIG21R used by the VVS. These aircraft were only delivered to Egypt and built in very limited numbers.
The authors of Foxbats over Dimona were four years too early…